


Action Figures

by thatonewriterchick



Category: Destiny - Fandom
Genre: Bonding, Child Guardian, Crucible, Destiny, Gen, Lord Shaxx - Freeform, Shaxx - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-13
Updated: 2019-03-13
Packaged: 2019-11-17 17:39:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18103277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatonewriterchick/pseuds/thatonewriterchick
Summary: Lord Shaxx comes face to face with his smallest fan.





	Action Figures

"Lord Shaxx, you’re very tall."

The statement was not a new development to Shaxx. He indeed stood a head or two higher than some of the taller Guardians. It wasn't the words that made him look up from his Crucible schedule, but the tone.

Small, high-pitched, drifting up from...somewhere.

Shaxx looked across the space where Arcite was cleaning guns. The frame didn't look up from his work, fitting the parts of the weapon with those satisfying metallic clicks Shaxx had come to love.

"How long did it take to grow that tall?"

Shaxx glanced to the left, but there was nothing unusual to be found. A wary glance to the right warranted him more of the same. Letting out a slow breath for patience, he turned to look behind him. More empty space greeted him. When he turned back to his screen, he saw it.

The tiny face peering up at him through the translucent orange screen. Names ran up her face as the system shuffled fireteams for the next day's matches and for a moment, Shaxx simply stared down at the child.

She blinked up at him with wide eyes. "Well?" She pressed finally.

"How did you get in here?" Which was as close as to _Why are you bothering me?_ as he dared. After he had made some Guardian's whelp cry a few months ago, he was wary when it came to children and their equally emotional parents.

"I walked." The child stepped to the side to set a couple of dolls onto his cluttered counter.

Not dolls, Shaxx realized. Action figures. There were two, paint chipping from the small bodies.

"They're the same size," she said, standing them up. One was made in his image, posed with his hands on his hips and in his white and orange armor, donning his one horned helm. The other was Zavala, easy to recognize in Vanguard colors. "So I thought you were the same size."

"We're not." Shaxx glanced toward the Hall of Guardians where the doors were closed. Someone had mentioned a meeting, though the raised voice on the other side of the door made him doubt it was productive. This must have been the kid that had everyone in the Tower worked up.

Ghosts rarely chose citizens who weren't adults, but it did happen. It was the adolescents and young adults that were most likely to fling themselves from the Tower's heights, who started fights in the main area and threw other Guardians from the Tower to celebrate their newfound immortality.

But this was a child, probably not even a decade old, if Shaxx had to guess. Chosen by a Ghost and destined to be a Guardian.

Obviously her parent was not enjoying that little development.

 

"Huh. Well, I still like you." Her eyes were large in her freckled face, a brown so rich, they were almost black. They were filled with fascination as she looked between her toy and him again. "Someone should tell them, so they can fix your figure."

Uncertain of why this child was still talking to him, Shaxx grunted as he focused on posting the match ups. Once he logged them, he realized it had been a whole two minutes since he'd heard that tiny voice.

He looked to where she had been standing, but she and her toys were gone.

Good riddance.

Shaxx began to put an order for Banshee to start a few new items he wanted for next month's matches. He had found that well-modded weapons made for excellent motivators and the extra effort Guardians put forth to earn them was well worth the glimmer.

_Click._

It was a sound he knew well. The sound of a safety being released. Shaxx looked to the source of the sound, taking a second to stare down the barrel of his own damn gun. Behind it was that small face, one eye squeezed shut, the other lined up with the sight.

She was perched on the counter, legs dangling. Despite the weight of the weapon, she held it steady with both hands. Improperly, even still, he noted.

"Bang," she deadpanned.

"Unacceptable!" He barked in response and she gave a start. It wasn’t wise, of course; the weapon was loaded and wielded by a startled child. But Mercy hadn't had to do a resurrection in a while; perhaps the Ghost needed a refresher.

Shaxx took the gun from her small hands and put the safety on. "Never point a weapon at someone unless you plan to put a bullet in them," he told her.

She was staring up at him with wide eyes.  "Yes, sir!"

Shaxx sighed. "Not sir. Not Lord. Just Shaxx." At least, not until she was a full-fledged Guardian.

"Okay...Shaxx." Her expression relaxed a fraction and then lit up. "Can I have one, though? A gun?"

"The kick back alone would knock you out," he told her, gruff. "Come back in twenty years and ask me then."

"Twenty?" The girl squeaked. "That's forever from now!"

"And yet still not long enough." He eyed her a moment. "What's your name, dreg?"

Either she didn't know what a dreg was, or she didn't recognize the insult because she beamed up at him. "You can call me Jun - all my friends do!" She frowned and made a show of rolling her eyes. "Only my mum calls me by my old lady name."

Shaxx almost bothered to wonder what qualified as an ‘old lady name,’ but decided he didn't really want to know. He blinked at the small hand being thrust at him.

"Nice to meet you officially...Shaxx," she said, smiling again.

He hesitantly took her hand with little more than a couple of fingers. Why was she so damn small? "Well met," he muttered, wondering when the hell Jun's mother was going to stop yelling and fetch her offspring. "And...in case you weren't aware...you're missing some teeth."

Rather than be horrified or grateful, Jun laughed. "That's because they fell out, silly!"

As if it were normal for pieces of oneself to suddenly stop being attached.

"You have a Ghost, tell it to fix it." He paused to consider it. "You _do_ have a Ghost, don’t you?"

Otherwise, her presence would be even more alarming.

"I do!" She cupped her palms in front of her and the white shell shimmered into sight, fixing a single blue eye first on its charge and then on Shaxx. "Look Iota, it's Shaxx! He doesn't like to be called Lord." She added the last part in a stage whisper.

"Maybe you should leave him to his tasks, Jun," the Ghost chided.

"But I was just about to ask him to show me the best Crucible clips from today," Jun confessed, looking crestfallen.

“ _You_ watch Crucible?” Shaxx asked, incredulous.

“Uh huh!” Jun’s head bobbed, sending her dark curls bouncing. Her eyes glittered with a sly wickedness. “So when I get older?” She leaned forward, grinning. “I’ll beat everyone.”

Shaxx considered her for a moment. “The dreg dreams of being Kell - I like it.” He turned to his computer. “Let’s begin.”

 

“Don’t look again…” Jun slapped her forehead when the hunter risked another glance and caught a headful of bullet. “You never look twice!” She craned her head back to look up at Shaxx. “Right?”

The screen wasn’t built to pivot, so he’d spent the last dozen matches holding her up so she could see clearly. It didn’t bother him; most of his guns outweighed her. “You get it – why don’t they?” He muttered, exasperated.

One of the massive doors leading to the Hall of Guardians eased open and a slip of a warlock came stomping out. She was furious, arc energy rushing over her. Jun’s hair began to frizz and stand, though she didn’t notice as she continued to stare at the screen.

“Got killed reloading…the worst!” She said with a shake of her head.

The angry warlock didn’t so much as glance at them as she passed. “Come along, Juniper,” she managed between gritted teeth.

“Aw…it was getting good,” Jun whined as Shaxx set her down. “Delta was making a comeback.”

“It will stream tomorrow.” Shaxx handed her the two action figures she’d arrived with.

“I know,” she said, clasping them to her chest. “But I want to know now!”

“Juniper!” The warlock’s voice floated from the stairs, maternal warning in her tone.

“Coming!” Jun turned to bound after her mother.

“Dreg.” Shaxx called.

Jun paused and glanced over her shoulder, looking curious.

“Delta comes back and decimates Alpha team.”

She flashed him a gap-toothed grin. “I can’t wait! Bye Shaxx!!” With a final wave, she disappeared down the hall.

Shaxx shut his computer down for the night and glanced over at Arcite, who had finished cleaning. He stood beside the shelves, head lowered in rest mode. All was as it should be, at least on his end.

He could hear the Vanguard’s voices on the other side of the door and was glad to be on the side that didn’t involve morality, politics and angry parents.

As he left, he checked to make sure the dreg hadn’t slipped away with his gun. It was still holstered and he shook his head as he took a moment to berate himself for losing it in the first place. To a child, no less. He’d been careless and it wouldn’t happen again.

He thought of the girl with her missing teeth and the ferocity packed into that tiny body.

And really hoped she grew up to be a titan.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Shaxx is this great mystery to me and I have a really hard time pinning down his character, but I know there's more to this masked man than Destiny is revealing (interesting lore in D2 aside). So I figured if I wrote him with a bunch of different people, maybe he would solidify in my headcanon as more than the guy who shouts all day on the Tower.


End file.
